At the U.S. Supreme Court, you know that it's going to be a hot argument when the usually straight-faced Justice Samuel Alito begins a question this way: "Let's say four people show up for a job interview ... this is going to sound like a joke, but it's not."

The issue before the court on Wednesday was whether retailer Abercrombie & Fitch violated the federal law banning religious discrimination when it rejected a highly rated job applicant because she wore a Muslim headscarf.

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Africa

Customers wait to collect money at the Juba Express money transfer company in Mogadishu, Somalia, on Feb. 12.

Mohamed AbdiwahabAFP/Getty Images

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3:32

Regulations intended to block money from getting into the hands of terrorist groups has led the last bank that handles most money transfers from the United States to Somalia to pull out of the business.

Somali refugees in the U.S. say their families back home need the money they send each month to survive, and they're counting on lawmakers and Obama administration officials, who are meeting in Washington on Thursday, to try to find a solution.

Europe

Robert Siegel talks to Sebastian Kurz, the Austrian Minister for Foreign Affairs, about revising a 1912 law giving Muslims the same rights as Christians and Jews. The new law would restrict foreign financing of mosques and Imams and encourage teaching Islam in German.

Africa

Kelly McEvers talks with Baher Mohamed, an Egyptian journalist for Al Jazeera English. Mohamed was imprisoned for alleged assistance to the banned Muslim Brotherhood. His trial is ongoing, though he is now out on bail. He talks about his concerns about freedom of expression in Egypt because several other journalists are still behind bars.

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Parallels

Lina Ejeilat helped found the Jordanian online magazine 7iber (pronounced 'Hebber'). While the government encourages free expression in principle, many strict regulations remain, as noted by the satirical chart next to her.

Art SilvermanNPR

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6:00

Earlier this month, Jordan's Information Minister Mohammad Al-Momani told a conference that freedom of expression can contribute to stopping radicalization.

On the very same day, a military court in the capital Amman sentenced a man to 18 months in prison for a Facebook post that was seen as insulting a friendly country, the United Arab Emirates.

Momani spent years studying at Rice University in Houston, so he knows what Americans think of as free expression. But he sees it a little differently.